Ordinary Toothpaste
by Kacey Conrad
Summary: A fanfic challenge from the SMK archives. - Thanks for all the reviews! I really appreciate it! :)


Title: "Ordinary Toothpaste"  
  
Author: Astraea Silver (Silver_Astraea@yahoo.com)  
  
Genre: Humor  
  
Rated: G  
  
Author's Notes: I'm rather new to the world of SMK so I hope you can forgive me for any not so good results of this little detail. *sheepish grin*  
  
Disclaimer: I own nothing but this completed story; I'm so poor and deprived! Yeah. Anyway, "Scarecrow and Mrs. King" and its characters belong to Shoot the Moon Productions and the actors and actresses who brought these awesome characters to life. This story was inspired by a challenge submitted by Melanie at the SMK fanfiction archives.  
  
| Write a VSS that includes: an iguana a fish hook a tierra {I'm assuming she meant a tiara and not Tierra del Fuego} a gumball machine a Frisbee and begins with the sentence:  
  
"I never knew you could do that with ordinary toothpaste!" |  
  
So credit for the first line and those little extras go to Melanie. (Thanks for such a cool challenge! I had a blast with this!)  
  
Now, without further ado, I give you, "Ordinary Toothpaste"!  
  
  
  
"I never knew you could do that with ordinary toothpaste!" The smaller human-Jamie, I think the others call him-stared in awe at his brother, Phillip, whose actions reminded one of performing major brain surgery.  
  
"It isn't ordinary toothpaste," Phillip explained, grinning mischievously and indicating a bowl of contaminated plaque-fighting gook. "I added a few things to get the right texture, right stickiness and flavor."  
  
"Flavor?" Jamie wrinkled his nose and arched an uncertain eyebrow. "What kinds of things?"  
  
"Oh, you know." The older boy shrugged nonchalantly. "Peanut-butter, mayonnaise, a mashed glue-stick or two."  
  
"Grandma's gonna kill you when she sees the mess you made in here. And what's she gonna say when she finds out you used her Prom Queen tiara as a Frisbee, then cracked it on the trellis and used this stuff to fix it up?"  
  
"We'll clean up the mess."  
  
"'We'll'?" Jamie repeated in disdain.  
  
Phillip nodded. ".And the tiara's good as new, so she'll never even know it was broken." He held up the royal mess. Not only did it look nothing like it did before it got a one-way ticket to the Trellis of Terror; it also crumbled apart in his hands. "Oops."  
  
"Boys, Mother, I'm home!" a voice called from the kitchen. I decided it was the one called Mom, or Amanda. (Humans can be so confusing sometimes.)  
  
It was then that they must have noticed me. Okay, they did notice me. Needless to say the boys took one look at me sitting by the door and gawked as if they'd spotted a kangaroo sharing a picnic lunch with a buffalo on their front step. Phillip, the one my human is having me take care of for awhile (please let this be temporary.oh, please let this be temporary.), quickly dropped his icky creation, then scooped me up and took me back to that incredibly cramped tank. I found my thoughts revolving around three things. One, my freedom had been cut short.again. Two, I couldn't understand why they had fairly large bedrooms and expected me to live in that microscopic-so I tend to exaggerate; get used to it-glass case. And three, I desperately wanted to introduce the kid to those new things the remotely decent humans call "towels". His filthy hands almost made me glad to be back behind the transparent prison walls. What's a fine iguana such as myself got to do to get some nice accommodations, anyway?  
  
"Now, Pete," Phillip chastised, wagging a finger at me, "you stay here!"  
  
I chuckled to myself. If this made them upset, I couldn't wait to see the looks on their faces when they discovered what I left for them in the next room.  
  
Peering out through the glass, I was so relieved that they were finally gone. No more sticky fingers, no more childish screams, and I had my next chance to escape.  
  
***SMK***SMK***SMK***  
  
"Someone missing a Frisbee?" Amanda asked and Phillip nodded questioningly. She pulled a bent plastic plate-like toy from behind her back. "Please don't leave your toys in the driveway, Dear. Remember what happened to Jamie's bike?"  
  
Phillip gave her a crooked smile and said sheepishly, "Sorry, Mom." He went to take the Frisbee when they both stared down at his hands.  
  
"Ugh, Phillip." Amanda made a face when she saw the mess. (I didn't blame her.) "I'm afraid to ask what you've gotten into this time, but after you wash up for dinner I want the explanation, even though I get the feeling it isn't a very good one." Her expression somewhat softened as Phillip headed for the bathroom, grumbling something so low even I couldn't really hear it.  
  
Intently, I watched Amanda and Jamie in the kitchen. The human they call Grandma or Dotty (again with the confusing naming system) called down to them that she'd join them for dinner soon. I remember thinking how good a few crickets would taste right about then, when my reverie was disrupted by sudden movement outside the kitchen window. I was certain I'd seen it-a man's head popped up like a sunflower that had been fed some serious Miracle Grow. (Sure, I guess I'm exaggerating again, but it was a good visual, right? Besides, with some things those commercials say one might truly expect plants to grow that fast. I'm not kidding. Watch one for yourself if you don't believe me! Oh, no. I'm rambling. I've definitely been in this place too long; I'm beginning to sound like Amanda, the one who never stops talking.)  
  
I scurried under a chair to get a better view while feeling confident that I wouldn't be captured and imprisoned once more. Not that that really mattered-I'd liberated myself at least ten times in that house already. (I can't exactly count. I just heard someone say that was a number. But don't tell the crickets. They think I know how many there are still to be eaten, so they don't even try to get away. .Or do they?)  
  
"Hey, Mom, did you see that?" asked Jamie, and saying Amanda looked nervous would be something of an understatement. Being the intellectual iguana that I am, I came to the conclusion that Jamie wasn't supposed to see Mr. Sunflower, and Amanda was worried that he had.  
  
"See what?" Amanda replied, obviously stalling and trying to be sure of what Jamie had seen before she went making excuses.  
  
"My fishing pole fell against the table and my gumball machine almost fell over," he animatedly explained. "Aw, man. The fishhook got caught on the raccoon's ear." I realized I had knocked over the pole when I was sneaking over to the chair, but at least I wasn't caught, and the kid seemed to find that amusing. Maybe I'd try that again later. I thought I saw a nice shiny thing holding flowers somewhere.  
  
"Mom!" Phillip cried from the bathroom. He tried to sound natural as he continued, "Where's that heavy duty counter clean-up stuff?"  
  
Amanda seemed more concerned with waving her arms around frantically at the window to get the man to hide again before Jamie saw either of them. As soon as the man ducked down, Amanda turned and casually instructed Jamie to go help his brother. I bet she didn't even hear what Phillip had said during her little Hokey-Pokey.  
  
As soon as Jamie left the room, Amanda sneaked out the back door. I decided to follow, in hopes of finding a little grub. I hid by a bush not far from the door, situating myself in a front-row seat to their conversation.  
  
"Hi, Lee," Amanda whispered, briefly making sure no one had returned to the kitchen yet. Little did she know, I was watching. I remembered something my human saw on the box once, about spies and secret agents, and that's what I felt like then. .A spy, that is, not the box.  
  
The man, Lee, was taller than most of the humans I had ever met, but then again, most humans look pretty big to me. It seemed he did a lot of the talking, and I found it of interest that anyone could shut Amanda up for long. Well, she did speak up occasionally, but she wasn't babbling on like she normally does.  
  
Once Amanda had finished berating Lee for never saying "hello," like a normal person, they discussed "business" and "cases"-things I didn't really understand. I couldn't see perfectly well from my place by the bush, but they were looking at one another the way I look at a cricket. I was beginning to wonder if they were going to eat each other's faces when there was a shriek from the house. Ah, I thought, the Dotty-woman must have found my "surprise". I had thought that was her dresser. I would have grinned, but that has never been a very easy thing for an iguana to do. Anyway, apparently the scream spooked Motor Mouth 'Manda and Long-Legged Lee, too, because she hurried to the door while he took off into the shadows. I stealthily crept inside behind Amanda before she could lock me out. I wanted to be free, just not that free.  
  
"What is it, Mother?" Amanda called, closing the door. (I'd have breathed a sigh of relief that she didn't see me, but that, too, is a challenge for us iguanas. See how easy you humans have it?)  
  
Dotty must not have heard Amanda. "I don't know what you call this, boys, but whatever it is doesn't belong on my foot!" she gasped.  
  
"It's toothpaste!" Jamie blurted out by the time I had reached the hallway.  
  
"And peanut-butter, mayonnaise, and a mashed glue-stick or two," Phillip added somewhat timidly.  
  
As Dotty questioned the boys and instructed them to finish cleaning it up, I made my way back to my tank, a little grateful that I couldn't be associated with the crime. (I guess my human and I saw that spy-thing on the box more than once.) Then I remembered my own crime; the one I committed in what I still assumed was Dotty's dresser. And I wondered what she would think of that after her encounter with the not-so-ordinary toothpaste.  
  
The End 


End file.
